This isn't just outsourcing. We The People are paying to train workers in other countries who then will be taking jobs outsourced from the US.
About Careers
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Why is our Government Sending our Jobs Overseas
In the wake of President Obama's promise to keep more hi-tech jobs in the U.S., a federal agency run by a hand-picked Obama appointee has created a $22 million program to train workers, including 3,000 specialists in IT, in South Asia. After these tech workers are trained, they will be placed with outsourcing vendors that provide business services to American companies looking to take advantage of the Asian subcontinent's low labor costs. This is being run by the US agency for international development, an agency whose mission is to help other nations develop into modern and functional economies in the hope that by raising their standards of living we will also raise the possibility of Democracy in their countries - and make them our friends in the process. In many ways over the years USAID has done a good job of this, helping countries to develop their own manufacturing sectors for their own people. But to use the resources of AID to help Sri Lanka, in this case, build IT and call centers for American countries is quite simply insanity.
ttp://www.
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This is what's coming after the election.
And Obama will sell the People out even bigger than he's done to date:
This morning on Washington Journal -- William Cohen, on the benefits of outsourcing and the coming trade deals:
http://www
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You see, that's NOT TRUE.
You really need to get off the Kool-Aid talking points and learn how that legislation was gamed.
Having insurance is not the same thing as being able to get medical care.
Between higher deductibles and co-pays (or not even being covered for everything), people are still going to go broke or not be able to afford treatment.
You will not believe what's in the pipeline to get around this. And, as long as medical care is for-profit, until the insurance industry is taken out of the equation, we are scr3wed.
About Barack Obama
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I guess you missed the memo.
Obama's already broadcast what he's going to do:
==According to excerpts from the Times, aides say that the president's been spending "a lot of time talking about Obama 2.0," brainstorming with administration officials about the best way to revamp the strategies & goals of the WhiteHouse.
And despite the predictions that Democrats may relinquish a large degree of legislating power, including perhaps control of the House & even Senate, Obama isn't thinking of the next two years as a period that'll be marked with the same obstructive nature from the GOP.
"It may be that regardless of what happens after this election, [Republicans] feel more responsible, either because they didn't do as well as they anticipated, & so the strategy of just saying no to everything & sitting on the sidelines & throwing bombs didn't work for them," Obama says in the article. "Or they did reasonably well, in which case the American people are going to be looking to them to offer serious proposals & work with me in a serious way."
DickDurbin says Obama's post-election agenda "will have to be limited & focused on the things that are achievable & high priorities for the American people." TomDaschle says Obama has to reach out more: "The key word is inclusion. He's got to find ways to be inclusive."==
http://www
More caving by Obama & Democrats to Republicans.
About Barack Obama
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When the Clintons were trying to sell HillaryCare, BillClinton held nationwide televised townhalls. One was with a specially chosen audience of healthcare professionals -- San Diego hospital doctors and nurses.
Clinton explained the plan, which would've expanded HMOs control over more people's access to treatment. HMOs&PPOs were relatively new, middlemen, between patients & their healthcare providers. Most people in HMOs&PPOs hated them, only Clinton didn't know that.
With a big smile, Clinton said, "HMOs will be managing the care". Like that would be a good thing that everyone would love. The audience groaned, shook their heads. Clinton was thrown off by their reaction, but he quickly recovered & continued with his pitch as if it never happened. He seemed to honestly have no idea that HMOs were a problem for Americans.
Clinton had a valuable opportunity to make real change right then, go back to the drawing board, and include the American people instead of the corporations in health care reform. But as a DLCer, he danced with them that brung 'im (Big Insurance).
3 years later, "As Good As It Gets", with Helen Hunt & Jack Nicholson came out. There's a line in it where Hunt, who's been getting the runaround from her HMO about her little boy's treatment for asthma, says, "That b@stid HMO!" When that movie opened, in theaters across America, people stood up & cheered at that line.
About Barack Obama
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ObamaCare is essentially HillaryCare (which I thought was terrible for the same reasons then), with one difference: The secret task force writing it behind closed doors in 1993 was, in 2010, Congress.
The objections to HillaryCare were reported in the media the same way they're were reported in 2010 (Republicans, saying there's either no problem or that this isn't the solution to the problem). Now as then, the media completely ignored the leftwing's objections which were the same, i.e., maintains status quo of employer-provided, for-profit, instead of expanding Medicare, making it single payer universal health care.
Bill Clinton, selling HillaryCare in 1993, in a couple of nationally televised Town Halls, was as tone deaf & oblivious to the objections as Obama has been from the Democratic Party's base (& healthcare professionals nationwide).
Candidate Obama in 2008: "Clintons did health care the wrong way, behind closed doors" - http://www
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Some of Obama's 'most ardent supporters' have defended him, saying that the times & stakes dictated he do that to make deals. The fact is that the deals Obama's made are lousy deals. Either he's a bad dealmaker, or the deals he's made (pro-corporate, anti-populist) are exactly what he set out to do.
And that's the real key to understanding DLC Democrats & how they operate. They need us to believe that they're not corrupt, not working for Corporations, but are just merely inept. They also need to remain likable & have us believe that they're not so inept that we won't keep voting for them. Even then, should we decide that as likable as an individual DLCer is, he or she is just not capable of achieving our shared objectives & vote them out, the DLC has more in the pipeline to take their place & continue the "ineptitude".
That's how we got Obama; he flew under the radar. We thought we were getting rid of the DLC's frontrunner, Hillary.
Democratic voters, for the most part, still haven't finished their love affair with BillClinton. Like the real debate & assessment of Reagan that's never happened, we've never assessed Clinton's true legacy. Eliminating social welfare safety nets, GlassSteagle, the Telecommun
About Barack Obama
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First of all, the coup already was. 2000. Bloodless, but a coup d'etat none the less.
But, in fact, the course was set years earlier when the oil men were allowed to commit treason and rigged the 1980 election. And even earlier than that when Dick Cheney & Donald Rumsfeld talked Ford into pardoning Nixon. That was really how this all began.
About Barack Obama
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What do you think a civil war would look like?
About Careers
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I suggest that you consider Democrats & Republicans as working on the same side, as tag relay teams (or like siblings competing for parental approval). 'Good cop/bad cop'. One side (Republicans) makes brazen frontal assaults on the People, & when the People have had enough, they put Democrats into power because of Democrats' populist rhetoric.
Once in power, Democrats consolidate Republicans' gains from previous years, & continue on with Republican policies but renamed, with new advertising campaigns. They throw the People a few bones, but once Democrats leave office, we learn that those bones really weren't what WeThePeople thought they were.
Whenever the People get wise to the shenanigans & all the different ways they've been tricked & start seeing Democrats as no different than Republicans, Democrats switch the strategy. They invent new reasons for failing to achieve the People's business -- This current one, because "Democrats are nicer, not as ruthless, not criminal" etc., is custom-tailored to Obama's 'bipartisan cooperation' demeanor. It's smirk-worthy when you realize they're trying to sell that they're inept, unable to achieve what they were put into office to do, & that's "a good thing".
Whichever of us is right (& I can back up my contentions with much evidence of Obama's not being any more ethical than BushCheney, beginning with his assertion that the president has the right to k!II American citizens with absolutely no due process, no oversight), how is his government's ineffectiveness working for you, for us? (I ask rhetorically)
About Careers
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I suggest that you consider Democrats & Republicans as working on the same side, as tag relay teams (or like siblings competing for parental approval). 'Good cop/bad cop'. One side (Republicans) makes brazen frontal assaults on the People, & when the People have had enough, they put Democrats into power because of Democrats' populist rhetoric.
Once in power, Democrats consolidate Republicans' gains from previous years, & continue on with Republican policies but renamed, with new advertising campaigns. They throw the People a few bones, but once Democrats leave office, we learn that those bones really weren't what WeThePeople thought they were.
Whenever the People get wise to the shenanigans & all the different ways they've been tricked & start seeing Democrats as no different than Republicans, Democrats switch the strategy. They invent new reasons for failing to achieve the People's business -- This current one, because "Democrats are nicer, not as ruthless, not criminal" etc., is custom-tailored to Obama's 'bipartisan cooperation' demeanor. It's smirk-worthy when you realize they're trying to sell that they're inept, unable to achieve what they were put into office to do, & that's "a good thing".
Whichever of us is right (& I can back up my contentions with much evidence of Obama's not being any more ethical than BushCheney, beginning with his assertion that the president has the right to k!II American citizens with absolutely no due process, no oversight), how is his government's ineffectiveness working for you, for us?
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Obama's 'most ardent supporters' claim that he's a centrist.
They say that he always has been & that those Democratic voters who voted for him because they believed him to be a populist, a liberal, weren't listening (forget the fact that Obama ran an aggressive progressive campaign, and to the left of Hillary). And, they say, conservatives who insist Obama's a liberal are either stup!d or so far right and unpolitically savvy, they don't even belong svcking up space and time on political discussion threads.
To those who thought that during the 2008 campaign, Obama was a moderate and wasn't trying to deceive anyone, what did you think he meant when you heard him saying during the campaign that people had to stay involved after the election, that they couldn't just vote for him, go away for four years and expect that he would do what they had hoped. That "there are powerful interests working against what the people want, and if you want me to do your bidding, you would have to make me do it".
What did you think he was talking about? Did you think he was just being honest, admitting he could be corrupted? Did you think he was trying to deceive centrists, corporatists, into believing he was really on their side but liberals and progressives could get him to keep his promises to them if they sat on him, kept after him?
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What do you think Obama is going to do after the November 2 elections if Republicans take control of one or both Houses of Congress?
Do you think he'll veto the legislation they pass (through reconciliation & every other means they can manage)? Do you think Obama will take to the bully pulpit, urge Americans to bury Republicans in email, phone calls, snail mail, & urge Democrats to block Republicans every way possible?
Or do you think that Obama's going to be making deal after deal with them, spinning what he can as somehow "Good for the People and Democrats", and/or, "I'm president of all the People, & the People in their infinite wisdom put Republicans in the majority, so I must honor their wishes & work with Republicans, & not try to obstruct their will"?
And if Democrats keep control of Congress? Do you think Obama's going to continue trying to work in a "bipartisan manner" with Republicans, keep flip-flopping on his campaign promises, & say that the election was a referendum on his trying "change the tone in Washington", and voters want him to do more of the same?
If you think Obama has seen the light, guess again:
http://www
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While most Democratic voters support liberal opinions (as do most voters, when informed of the facts), the Democratic establishment is not liberal; it's pro-corporate pro-CORPORATE, PRO-CORPORATE. And anti-populist.
Like Mark Penn.
If you were alive pre-Reagan, you would know that liberal policies were what created the greatest middle class in the history of the world. All that Republicans and conservatism gave us was fear over commies, and the worst in human behavior. Blacklists and union-busting is the result of the worst in human nature.
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When informed of the issues, most Americans agree with liberal policies. Neither they nor I would characterize themselves as far-anything or extreme, but mainstream. For example, nobody likes the idea of abortion, but most Americans do not want the government involved if they find themselves in the predicament of an unwanted pregnancy. And if you frame it as, "You like to k!ll babies?!?!?!?!", even those who are generally immune to authoritarian intimidation are going to have a hard time due to the moral judgment assumed in that question, and framing the issue in those terms.
About Obama Administration
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Obama, RahmEmanuel, the DLC, DavidAxelrod, DavidPlouffe, all have worked their @$$es off to prevent real progressives getting into office. One example right off the bat is Blanche Lincoln.
The White House put its full weight & support behind Blanche Lincoln over the true progressive (& union-backed) candidate in the primary, Bill Halter.
This wasn't unlike when Obama made a deal with Arlen Specter and put the full weight and support of the Democratic machine behind Specter during the 2010 primary in Pennsylvania, trying to buy off (among other alternative candidates Democratic voters in PA might have wanted to vote to have representing them) Joe Sestak. Consider that -- Obama actively went about trying to prevent Democratic voters from choosing their preferred candidate for the US so that a DINO, Republican Arlen Specter, could retain the seat.
BlancheLincoln's 18 points down behind the GOP candidate JohnBoozman.
Guess who could beat Boozman in Arkansas? Lt. Governor BillHalter. Because, like just about all Americans, Arkansans would prefer an authentic, likable candidate, even if it's a progressive.
But more progressives in Congress means real populist legislation getting passed into law. Real reform bills, that re-regulate banks & big business. Real stimulus bills, with jobs creation, green clean energy development, and more. But that's not who or what Obama & the DLC-controlled Democrats are about.
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'Party government' runs the US Congress, has since the late 1790s, and the Democratic Party has controlled both Houses of Congress (with a supermajority in the Senate) and the White House since 2008.
That's what being in the majority party's caucus means -- You get the perks of the power by caucusing with the majority party. If you want to keep that committee chair, you do as the leaders of the party tell you to do.
There is nothing that Democrats in Congress are doing that Obama hasn't signed off on, much less ordered.
When you're the president, you are the head of your political party. When your political party controls both Houses of Congress & the White House, you do what the head of your party tells you to do. Especially a hugely popular president, who came into the WhiteHouse with more Americans having voted for him & his campaign of CHANGE than had ever voted before in the history of the country. FOR A BLACK MAN IN R@CIST AMERICA. Go figure.
That's PLATINUM political capital, & Obama came into office with a huge amount. So much that the GOP was in a puddle in the gutter outside of the US Capitol. After the 2008 election, Republicans weren't just on the ropes; they were down for the count. What did Obama do? He issued them a pardon.
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How is Obama and the DLC-controlled Democratic Party any different?
Clinton signed the repeal of Glass-Steagall, and has said the only problem was the uptick rule. (Incredible)
Americans put Obama and Democrats into power to get affordable, quality medical treatment for all. Not an insurance policy for a few million more. Americans do not want their ability to get affordable quality medical treatment dependent upon their employment, or through their employer.
And Obama, on his own, decided to institutionalize the insurance industry as the permanent gatekeepers to Americans getting medical treatment. Insurance companies add nothing to the equation. They take a profit, a chunk out of money that can and should go to medical treatment.
Obama took the one means of lowering costs off the table, a public option. ZAP! Gone.
And, Obama and Democrats keep the wars going.
No difference between the parties. One just comes in a packaging that has been focus-group tested to appeal to you more.
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Insults and fear.
This is all that 0bamab0ts have to offer.
If you're going to live by the sw0rd (absolute statements like, "Every sitting President who's primaried loses the election"), you're going to have to d!e by it -- A black man had won, and let's not forget that Obama was further hand!capped by being a sitting senator (none had won since Kennedy).
Do you think it's just ju-ju, some magic rule of thumb that if any of those sitting presidents hadn't been primaried, they would have won? Johnson, by the way, didn't run for reelection, which may have more to do with his not winning in 1968 than anything else.
And did you ever think that maybe it's those who stubbornly cling to bad sitting presidents who are the problem?
Yes, let's keep a neoliberal president who is not only bad for We The People, but also isn't going to win, instead of cutting our losses and getting the best candidate for our problems.
About Barack Obama
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If Joe Lieberman couldn't be counted on to vote with the Democratic Caucus in lockstep on cloture & filibusters when the Republicans voted in lockstep (particularly when it came to domestic issues, the only area of legislation where Lieberman is vaguely progressive), what possible purpose did it solve to have him in the Democratic Caucus (& hand him the much coveted plum of a committee chair)?
http://www
http://thi
http://www
For his treachery against Democrats going back years (at least as far as the 2000 presidential campaign, when he conceded absentee military ballots), Lieberman got everything out of that deal, and Democrats, We the People, got what?
About Barack Obama
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If Obama really wanted BlueDogs' votes or JoeLieberman's vote on legislation like real healthcare reform, he would have done to Lieberman & the BlueDogs what he did to DennisKucinich (the last hold-out on the ProgressiveCaucus, all of whom had pledged to vote for a healthcare bill only if it had a public option, and who all caved). Obama flew to Cleveland and rallied Kucinich's constituents against him and he got Kucinich's vote.
Where was that mentality with JoeLieberman, BlancheLincoln, the other BlueDogs and even OlympiaSnowe? If the president of the UnitedStates had used the bully pulpit against them, a lot of progressives would have respected that and said, "You tried your best". But Obama didn't try. He cut a deal, months earlier, cutting the will of the People off at the knees. The public is powerless in backroom deals.
About Barack Obama
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Democrats have everyone they need, to do the job they were put into power to do for the American people.
During the Bush years, Democrats said if the People wanted change, they had to put Democrats in the majority in Congress. So in 2006, we did. Nothing changed.
Democrats said, "You have to give us more Democrats -- 60 in the Senate". In 2008, we gave them the 60. And the White House.
Obama came into office with the wind at his back. More people voted for him, a black man in America, than ever in the history of the US. They did it because of his ability to persuade that he was going to change the system, end the corporatocracy, lobbyism in government -- He was going to be the People's president, not a corporate t00I.
And no sooner did Obama get elected than he slammed the brakes on the momentum of his election & a filibuster-proof Senate (tentative yet, with 2 senators, Kennedy & Byrd, at d.e.a.t.h's door), Obama did a 180-degree turn on his promises & sloooooowed everything down. To "work in a bipartisan manner with Republicans", after Republicans had already announced they were going to block everything Democrats wanted to do, vote no on everything, in lockstep.
Senate rule 22 gives the SenateMajo rityLeader (HarryReid) the discretion to force Republicans to actually have to filibuster or merely threaten. Reid lets them merely threaten.
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"liberal Democrats are too demanding, too unrealistic about what can actually get done in Washington"
==========
It's spin like this that drives me up a freakin' wall.
You don't run on transparency government, and a public option, then say, "It's congress's job to write the legislation", then undermine the congressional committees working on that legislation by cutting secret deals that eliminate any public option.
That's the story of Obama. The man is not an honest agent. It k!lls me to say that. Go back and listen to Candidate Obama's speeches, debates and interviews. His halting delivery and precision in speech is no different than Bush-speak, only it took a team of speechwriters to have oxymor0nic phrases and terms coming out of Bush's mouth (Clear Skies Initiative, No Child Left Behind, compassionate conservatism), and the lawyer in Obama can do it on his own. Slowly, haltingly, but he can manage.
Democratic voters got punk'ed but good.
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Do you know what the DLC is, and who is in it?
About Barack Obama
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I think what we're really looking for is a Bobby Kennedy. Without the tragic ending.
About Barack Obama
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Why do you think that?
Why do you think that what he's doing isn't exactly what he intended on doing?
About Barack Obama
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Obama's already broadcast what he's going to do, no matter who is controlling Congress:
==According to excerpts from the Times, aides say that the president's been spending "a lot of time talking about Obama 2.0," brainstorming with administration officials about the best way to revamp the strategies & goals of the WhiteHouse.
And despite the predictions that Democrats may relinquish a large degree of legislating power, including perhaps control of the House & even Senate, Obama isn't thinking of the next two years as a period that'll be marked with the same obstructive nature from the GOP.
"It may be that regardless of what happens after this election, [Republicans] feel more responsible, either because they didn't do as well as they anticipated, & so the strategy of just saying no to everything & sitting on the sidelines & throwing bombs didn't work for them," Obama says in the article. "Or they did reasonably well, in which case the American people are going to be looking to them to offer serious proposals & work with me in a serious way."
DickDurbin says Obama's post-election agenda "will have to be limited & focused on the things that are achievable & high priorities for the American people." TomDaschle says Obama has to reach out more: "The key word is inclusion. He's got to find ways to be inclusive."==
http://www
More caving by Obama & Democrats to Republicans.
About Barack Obama
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Obama and the DLC-controlled Democrats in Congress should have zigged (gone left) instead of zagged (gone even farther right than the DLC has taken the Democratic Party in the past 20 years).
All the conditions were ripe for undoing the pro-corporate legislation that has destroyed the middle class since Reagan (and really since Nixon), but Obama blew the political capital bestowed on him in the 2008 election, pardoned Bush-Cheney and gave the GOP a pass to resurrect itself.
About Barack Obama
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I've explained & included links that support how I come to my perspective.
Why don't you lay out what you believe to be the case, and include links to support it?
About 2010 Elections
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The economic meltdown was the means for achieving everything that real Democrats have been unable to do for the last 20 years. A real stimulus would have solved every last problem we're facing today. It would've & should've leveled the economic playing field. It should have had twice as much money going for jobs, with WPA-type programs, money for public works projects to rebuild America's infrastructure on all fronts, from roads, bridges, high-speed rail, a 'Manhattan Project'-style effort on clean & green sustainable energy (something else that Obama talked about during the 2008 campaign that went by the wayside as soon as he got into the WhiteHouse), & building that new energy grid (& communications) infrastructure across the US, along with massive infusion into high tech, SMART communities (residenti
And the real healthcare reform that Obama & Democrats were put into power to do (getting affordable quality medical treatment for all, along with educational expansion & job training for the increased medical needs of a nation being 'Spersed with toxic chemicals by Big Corporations around the nation).
Obama & Democrats were NOT put into power to protect the profits of the insurance and pharmaceutical industries, or institutionalize the insurance industry as the gatekeepers to healthcare. For-profit medical care, with the insurance industry as the Don Fanucci ( http://www
About 2010 Elections
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What's never gotten discussed, just glossed over, is the why of what Obama conceded, before negotiations ever began (ground that wasn't Obama's to concede), before a national public debate on healthcare could take place (& short-circuited such a debate from actually happening).
On the one hand, I'd think that Obama's fans would like to talk about it, because it lays waste to Teabaggers' claims that Obama's a socialist.
But OTOH, in doing so it also exposes Obama's real character & agenda, i.e., Obama's a DINO (he's a neoliberal, which is NOT to be confused with liberalism - http://en.
Because when we're talking about the miserable economy that Obama inherited, when we're talking about the financial decimation of the middle class & the poor in the US, when we're talking about the healthcare crisis in America & every other crisis that has this nation & the People circling the drain, had Obama been a REAL Democrat, had Obama been the masterful politician that CandidateObama had been, he would've recognized it as the same kind of *shock&awe* opportunity that Bush-Cheney-R0ve took advantage of to mug & rob the American people throughout the last decade. He would've used the IMMENSE political capital that voters handed him in 2008 to get a real stimulus bill, before TARP2 got handed out, (& with strings); real financial reform, instead of the DLC's & GOP's government privatization plans.
About 2010 Elections
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White House-PhRma Secret Memo Surfaces:
==Since mid-July, the WhiteHouse and the drug industry’s Washington lobby, PhRMA, have denied any specific agreement that would give the industry big benefits in exchange for its support for PresidentB
http://blo
http://pol
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About 2010 Elections
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If Obama had really wanted JoeLieberman's vote, he would have done to Lieberman and the BlueDogs what he did to DennisKucinich (the last hold-out on the ProgressiveCaucus, all of whom had pledged to vote for a healthcare bill only if it had a public option, and who all caved). What did Obama do to Kucinich? Obama flew to Cleveland & rallied Kucinich's constituents against him. http://blo
Where was that mentality with JoeLieberman, BlancheLincoln, the other BlueDogs and even OlympiaSnowe? If the president of the UnitedStates had used the bully pulpit against them, a lot of progressives would have respected that and said, "You tried your best".
But Obama didn't try. He cut a deal. Months earlier, undermining all of the congressional committees except Baucus's (Senate Finance Committee) writing healthcare legislation that reflected the will of the People, cutting those efforts off at the knees. The public was powerless in the backroom deal. A deal that Obama l!ed about, & then was forced to admit when secret memos went public. ("WhiteHouse insists: No deal with PhRma" -
http://www.huf fingtonpos
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About 2010 Elections
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The older I get, the more I appreciate how life and politics and democracy work best simply. No game-playing. Honesty, transparency. Even if others are playing games, the only way to beat them is with honesty and transparency.
That's what Democratic voters thought they were getting with Obama. Transparency in government. Simple and direct action, from what they thought was a man and a political party dedicated to working on behalf of the middle and poor classes.
And had that been true of Obama and the DLC-Democrats controlling Congress, that they were working for the average citizens of the US, there would have been, among many things, no putting the power of the White House and the DNC behind Blue Dogs because it's going to take Progressives to get real Democratic legislation through.
Yet that's what Obama's been doing, working to get more conservatives into Congress. In the Democratic primaries of this election cycle, when presidents do not get involved, Obama put the full weight and support of the White House and the DNC behind Blue Dog BlancheLincoln and DINO Arlen Specter over the actual progressives running against them. Trying to prevent Democratic voters choosing who they want to represent them in Congress (Joe Sestak in PA).
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About 2010 Elections
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I am an old patriotic liberal Democrat. Not 'country western song' kind of patriotism, but a 'Williamsb
I've always been struck by a common thread that goes through everything in America that has kept it up and running despite some major assaults (but nothing like Nixon-Bush
It's a singular principle that has made this country a beacon for people who want a better life, to live free and pursue dreams. And in its absence, what is destroying the nation, and the world beyond us. It got coined in the 1950s, and I remember it resonated and was conflated into our culture through a comic book hero: 'Superman', "who fights a never ending battle for truth, justice, and the American way!"
It's simple truth. Equal justice under the law for all. No Machiavelli intrigue.
I look at what is. I listen to what people say and then what they do. I watch events as they unfold, and I appreciate the patterns. If what politicians say they're going to accomplish is what they deliver.
I know enough about the legislative process and policy and government agencies (there really are no new ideas, and it's all just about trying to have your idea prevail over all others) to know where it's heading.
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About 2010 Elections
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"As for the rest of your posts, they read like an hysterical conspiracy theory - a tempest in a teapot. While I may agree with your sentiments, I for one am not ready to drive myself off the deep end like that."
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A conspiracy theory about what? To do what?
It's the 0bamabots who have "conspiracy theories" on the brain, with Obama playing "3D chess", "double-secret plans" to thwart Republicans, which the 0bots can't articulate, don't really know, but they're taking it on faith. Blind faith. Blind loyalty to a man who has done nothing to earn it, except put a 'D' after his name.
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About 2010 Elections
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Because Obama got Lieberman to provide him with cover after the court ordered his DoD to release the torture & abuse photos of prisoners in Iraq and Afghanistan (the ones that Obama had pledged during the 2008 campaign to release them and then flip-flopped after he got into the White House):
http://ac3
With Obama's pledge for transparency ripped to shreds with his reneging on releasing the thousands of t0rture & abuse photos of detainees, Obama used Lieberman to slip into legislation giving the SecretaryOfDefense the power to gut FOIA & bury the evidence, the photos, forever.
http://www
http://www
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About 2010 Elections
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And if Obama didn't get commitments from Lieberman before letting him into the DemocraticCaucus, why didn't he?
Are you suggesting that it was just another lousy deal by Obama? Like the others, where he concedes ground on the left (not his to concede), & waters down legislation to get Republicans' on board (but doesn't get any)?
Was it another giveaway to big business, another selling out of the People, like the $20 billion from BP that isn't written on paper, no contract, isn't securitized & that only $3 billion has changed hands (as well as blackmail by BP to not pay another cent unless it can continue risky & dangerous deepwater drilling in sensitive waters)?
Or was it like Obama's claim (out of one side of his mouth) that "BP will pay ‘every dime’ for oil spill" (even making sure millions would hear that message by making a nationwide prime time address - http://www
Robbing New Orleans to Pay for BP's Spill -
http://mot
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Increasing The Tax On Oil To Pay For The BP Mess -
http://www.huf fingtonpos
It sure sounds like it.
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Obama never pressured JoeLieberman, BenNelson or BlancheLincoln, or any Blue Dog. That's by their own admission. ( http://www.huf fingtonpos
http://fdl
The Democratic leadership could've taken away committee chairs of members in their caucus that joined with Republicans and threatened to filibuster a public option for healthcare. Obama did more arm-twisting on behalf of Lieberman remaining in the Democratic Caucus & keeping the chairmanship of that committee than he did on behalf of healthcare.
The DNC could've taken away reelection funds. But it hasn't. Because Lieberman & Blue Dogs (& Republicans) provide cover to Obama & the DLC-controlled Democratic Party, to let them continue to serve corporate interests over the interests of the People.
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Without 60, without his voting on cloture/fi
For both the short term, immediate problem of advancing Democratic legislation, and the long term effort to expand Democratic influence, rewarding treachery & expanding JoeLieberman's power wasn't & isn't in the interests of the DemocraticParty or the People.
Do you really believe that Obama got nothing for that concession? No agreement that Lieberman would vote as Obama told him to vote? No agreement from Lieberman that he wouldn't join Republicans in cloture/fi
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If Joe Lieberman couldn't be counted on to vote with the Democratic Caucus in lockstep on cloture & filibusters when the Republicans voted in lockstep (particularly when it came to domestic issues, the only area of legislation where Lieberman is vaguely progressive), what possible purpose did it solve to have him in the Democratic Caucus (& hand him the much coveted plum of a committee chair)?
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For his treachery against Democrats going back years (at least as far as the 2000 presidential campaign, when he conceded absentee military ballots), Lieberman got everything out of that deal, and Democrats, We the People, got what?
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So what about healthcare reform, a public option? Where was Lieberman on the subject? First, where was Obama?:
Obama now says he didn't campaign on the public option. The Google (and my ears and eyes) says he did. A lot:
http://www
From Politico, 11/19/09 -- "Joe Lieberman Says The Public Option Wasn't Part Of Health Care Reform Until After The Presidential Campaign" -
==According to Politico, Sen. Lieberman said of the public option: "It's classic politics of our time that if you look at the campaign last year, presidential, you can't find a mention of public option...It was added after the election as a part of what we normally consider health insurance reform - insurance market reforms, cover people, cover people who are not covered." ==
But it's not true:
Numerous Outlets Reported On The Inclusion Of A Public Option Or Plan During The 2008 Campaign
http://pol
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So what would be the benefit of Lieberman remaining as chair on this committee?:
Candidate Obama certainly implied he'd be investigating Katrina -
http://www
And Obama busted McCain for NOT only not voting for it, but for lying about it and saying that he had supported investigating Katrina:
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On 2/2/06, Obama voted yes, along with Lieberman, to establish a congressional commission to examine the Federal, State, and local response to the devastation wrought by Hurricane Katrina in the Gulf Region of the United States especially in the States of Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and other areas impacted in the aftermath and make immediate corrective measures to improve such responses in the future.
http://www
But once Obama got in office, once Lieberman got into the Democratic Caucus and resume his chairmanship of the Governmental Affairs & Homeland Security Committee, "We're looking forward, not back."
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Obama insisted Lieberman keep the chairmanship of the GovernmentalAffairs & HomelandSe
http://www.huf fingtonpos
Chairing committees is what Senators aspire to. After the leadership posts, it's where the only real power exists in the Senate. Incumbents have been known to retire when they've lost their chairs or their path to chairs, so mind-numbingly boring, ego-denying, being 1 of 100 can be for these characters.
http://www.huf fingtonpos
Without the chairmanship, Lieberman wasn't interested in being in the Democratic Caucus.
http://www
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I'm not counting Lieberman as a Democrat, nor am I arguing with you about that, although you might want to take it up with Lieberman's spokeswoman Leslie Phillips, who told Newsweek in early 2007 (after he'd left the Democratic Party after losing the Democratic nomination in 2006), "The senator is an independent Democrat and answers only to the people who elected him to office and to his own conscience." http://www
I've already explained 'party government' to you, & how that translates into the actual functioning of the Senate: Through a hierarchy, defined by Caucuses, what it means to be in the majority's caucus. As a general rule, for all votes having to do with cloture & filibusters (particularly when it comes on landmark or 'centerpiece' legislation that the parties have just run on), every senator can be counted on to vote with the caucus that he's in.
Obama insisted Lieberman remain in the DemocraticCaucus, in spite of multiple betrayals by Lieberman before & during the 2008 election (Lieberman endorsed McCain, campaigned FOR McCain) & over the objections of the members of the DemocraticCaucus.
http://www.huf fingtonpos
http://www
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I'm not counting Lieberman as a Democrat, nor am I arguing with you about that, although you might want to take it up with Lieberman's spokeswoman Leslie Phillips, who told Newsweek in early 2007 (after he'd left the Democratic Party after losing the Democratic nomination in 2006), "The senator is an independent Democrat and answers only to the people who elected him to office and to his own conscience." http://www
I've already explained 'party government' to you, & how that translates into the actual functioning of the Senate: Through a hierarchy, defined by Caucuses, what it means to be in the majority's caucus. As a general rule, for all votes having to do with cloture & filibusters (particularly when it comes on landmark or 'centerpiece' legislation that the parties have just run on), every senator can be counted on to vote with the caucus that he's in.
Obama insisted Lieberman remain in the DemocraticCaucus, in spite of multiple betrayals by Lieberman before & during the 2008 election (Lieberman endorsed McCain, campaigned FOR McCain) & over the objections of the members of the DemocraticCaucus.
http://www
http://www
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"Now you're trying to say something else about caucuses, which means you're counting Joe Lieberman as a Democrat, which he's not, as well as several others, which they're not."
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HP doesn't grant as much space as is obviously necessary to hold informed discussions between people of wide-ranging educational & informational backgrounds. Shorthand is therefore necessary; readers with less knowledge & perspective are going to get left behind.
I try to be mindful of the space limitations & not override it with multiple-part posts unless I think it's necessary, in which case I'll provide background, history with reference citations, to support my point. But it can be, has been, 'unappreciated', & usually by the very people who need to read it most, i.e., the least informed.
I think now is one of those times where it's called for.
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"Now you're trying to say something else about caucuses, which means you're counting Joe Lieberman as a Democrat, which he's not, as well as several others, which they're not."
==========
"Several" others?
Aside from Lieberman and Bernie Sanders (who is an actual socialist, self-proclaimed), everyone else in the Democratic Caucus is a Democrat.
About 2010 Elections
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